RLMT500 Week 1 Discussion

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American Public University *

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500

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Industrial Engineering

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Jan 9, 2024

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Good afternoon fellow classmates and professor, Supply chains primarily consist of four main functions that consists of sourcing, manufacturing, warehousing, and distribution. Supply chain management controls the flow of products, information, and financial resources between these functions (CSCMP, n.d.). Logistics is a component of a supply chain that facilitates these flows between functions through inbound and outbound activities throughout supply chain operations to ultimately deliver finished goods and services to the end consumer. This down to upstream topology that describes a supply chain is commonly known as a forward supply chain with forward logistics consisting of predetermined activities and events that take place along the supply chain process. However, reverse supply chains and logistics processes differ because the reverse flow of products and information are triggered by an event instead of being predetermined, which can be more difficult to manage than forward logistics (He et al., 2016). The University of Nevada, Reno Reverse Logistics Council define reverse logistics as the flow of goods and information to flow in the opposite direction of normal logistics activities in supply chains (Rogers, 1999). This includes transporting and processing returned products that may be defective or damaged, have been recalled, or are considered excess inventory. Additionally, reverse logistics also consists of activities that include recycling, remanufacturing, and to reuse or repurpose returned products to capture value (Gaustad et al., 2018). One of the biggest reasons why it is more difficult to manage than forward logistics is because the process requires additional resources after goods are delivered to the end consumer. For example, to return a product would require additional transportation for moving the item back to the retailer, distribution center, or third-party logistics provider. Having multiple return channels can create coordination complexities that would be difficult to manage. In addition,

processing returned items take longer than forward logistics because the receiving facility has to determine if the product is broken, damaged, serviceable, unserviceable, and whether it will be recycled, remanufactured, or reused. Moreover, if the product is determined to be disposed, the certain type of disposal facility must also be determined, such as if the item must go to a recycling facility, landfill, or hazardous waste collection center. Companies that sell products that may be hazardous have to deal with the additional work to determine the level of hazardous risk that can impact the environment. For instance, General Electric (GE) has to identify materials at risk using the periodic table to determine which elements are used in their component items and what the criticality concerns are for whenever they have to dispose their items (Gaustad et al., 2018). This brings the company away from their core competencies of developing new technology and innovations. The issue of excess inventory from reverse logistics has been reported on the military side of supply chain operations where Colonel Walden (2001) states, “inaccurate inventory records couples with a lack of visibility of distribution inventory for the Army has produced items being repaired or rebuilt that are excess to the organization and therefore must be returned to the wholesale system through the reverse supply chain.” This highlights the inventory management challenges of returned items presenting difficulties with tracking, categorizing, and storing items that can be used by other units, which results to reorders to bypass long lead times that creates excess inventory not being used. Lastly, reverse logistics causes complications with managing costs while providing customer satisfaction due to the additional transportation, processing, disposal, and manpower to redistribute returned items that can take longer than forward supply chains. This can be costlier than forward logistics for reasons of creating challenges, complexities, variabilities, and other constraints. Proper planning, accurate forecasting, and determining the probability of a customer

returning a product is hard to predict because it is dependent on the customer’s behavior and emotions. Therefore, customer confidence and expectations can be degraded if not managed appropriately, which is why reverse logistics is more difficult than forward logistics. -Jake References CSCMP. (n.d.). supply chain management definitions and glossary . SCM Definitions and Glossary of Terms. https://cscmp.org/CSCMP/Educate/SCM_Definitions_and_Glossary_of_Terms.aspx Gaustad, G., Krystofik, M., Bustamante, M., Kedar, B. (2018). Circular economy strategies for mitigating critical material supply issues. Resources, Conservation and Recycling, 135 , 24-33. He, Q., Ghobadian, A., Gallear, D., Beh, L.-S., & O'Regan, N. (2016). Towards conceptualizing reverse service supply chains. Supply Chain Management: An International Journal, 21 (2), 166-179. doi:10.1108/SCM-01-2015-0035 Rogers, D. (1999). Going Backwards: Reverse Logistics Trends and Practices , Reno, NV, University of Nevada, Reno. Walden, J. L. (2001). Reverse logistics: A monogram . Army command and general staff Coll Fort Leavenworth KS School of Advanced Military Studies .

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RLMT500 Week 1 Discussion

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